


Of Family

by RosesToPaint



Series: Family [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Domestic Violence, Magical Realism, Mentions of Prostitution, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-08
Updated: 2015-10-08
Packaged: 2018-04-25 10:30:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 729
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4956838
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RosesToPaint/pseuds/RosesToPaint
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A family hides many secrets. Sometimes you might think you know the worst of it - chances are, you're wrong.<br/>Part I of a series of snippets about a family that's not quite ... normal.<br/>Introduction: Hannah White</p>
            </blockquote>





	Of Family

Making food was the only thing she was really good at.

Hannah found that out at a relatively early age, simply because it was the one thing that didn’t get her into trouble. When she was four, her mother left. The woman had fled the house after years of verbal and sometimes physical abuse and, even though she was bitter that the feeble, weak willed woman had taken neither her, nor any of her younger siblings with her, the vague memory of whispered bedtime stories and stark bruises against pale skin made it impossible to hate her.

 

And so her mother was only the first name on an ever growing list of people who had disappointed her, and the feelings of love and attachment faded into nostalgic fondness and something bittersweet instead of turning sour.

In childish stubbornness and desperation she had tried to feed her younger sisters, barely a few months old then, herself. Only a sparse few days later she had had to concede defeat, when it became clear that none of them were able to keep down anything solid yet. Their father had been of little help. He was not so far gone as to beat his infant daughters, but his wife’s abandonment had driven him deeper into the bottle, and her age didn’t safe her from getting slapped around a little when she dared to ask for anything.

“Keep them quiet”, he’d say. “There’s enough food in the fridge.”

And indeed, miraculously, there was. The discovery that mashed potatoes made for much better baby food probably saved all of them, her father included, if only from jail. She feels guilty to this day for thinking that, maybe, it would have saved at least two of them from such a dreary existence if she had sacrificed one of her sisters to starvation.

It had occurred to her when she was nine that the smell of a little baby corpse might have brought the police to their door, to sweep them away to a different family, a nice one, or at least somewhere else at all.

Mashed potatoes led to roast potatoes led to carrots and meat and the one or other dessert eventually. By the time she turned twelve she was good enough to satisfy her picky little sisters, keep her father in a relatively good mood and endear herself to the occasional conquest he liked to bring home.

Marie and Erica tended to shy away from them, wary of the strangers in their house and worried about upsetting the delicate balance that kept the atmosphere just on this side of too tense.

Hannah liked the girls.

Sometimes they were well dressed, soft spoken woman that seemed to remind both Hannah and her father of her mother. Often they would stick around for a while, trying to gain her favor as the oldest and most accessible of the girls. They were nice. Some of them would teach her new recipes, buy her and her sisters new books and dresses, help with the housework; but sooner or later the bruises would appear on their skin too and then she knew it wouldn’t be long before they were gone forever. Nice women always meant a lovely few weeks, but Hannah quickly learnt not to get attached.

Sometimes the women were harder, sharper somehow.

They dressed in brightly colored, boldly cut clothes and they smelt of cigarettes and alcohol. Hannah liked them better. The prostitutes never stuck around for long, but they tended to come back eventually.

There was Amy from the city, in her fancy dresses and her cloying vanilla perfume; Mandy with the bright blonde hair and the red nails; or Karen with her piercings and tattoos, who worked the docks and answered to no man. They didn’t try to promise a better life, often came from similar families and had no illusions that pretty dresses would put her father in a better mood.

They gave her different things.

They showed her how to cover bruised with cheap makeup, how to filch wallets out of pretty purses and how to kick a man in the nuts and run.

“One day,” Karen said, carding her fingers through Hannah’s long hair one morning, “one day, when you’re old enough, you’ll come with me. It’s not a good life, but it’s better than this. It’s all people like us get.”


End file.
